This is one of two stories involving photos of flag-draped coffins. In this one, Russ Kick used the Freedom of Information Act (created after Watergate and which Bush does everything he can to shut down) to obtain photos taken by the Department of Defense.mjh
Air Force adds to controversy with its own coffin photos By Hal Bernton and Ray Rivera, Seattle Times
The week before Kuwait cargo worker Tami Silicio lost her job for releasing a photograph of soldiers’ coffins, the Air Force made its own release of several hundred photographs of flag-draped coffins to the operator of an Internet site.
The Air Force photos were shot by personnel at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware and released — reluctantly — in response to a Freedom of Information Act request submitted by a 34-year-old First Amendment activist [Russ Kick].
Release of the more than 360 photographs further erodes a 13-year-old ban on the media taking photos of the transport of coffins from overseas battle zones to Dover, site of the military’s largest mortuary. …
In coming days, there could be more coffin images circulating as Kick’s Web site offers “high-resolution” Dover photos.
Some of the Dover pictures, already posted online, depict rows of flag-draped coffins of American soldiers killed in Iraq being unloaded from Air Force cargo planes. Some show soldiers kneeling to adjust flags on coffins.
In an interview, Kick said he believes the public has a right to see the pictures, and that they are respectful to grieving families.
“I would make the argument that trying to hide the photos of these people who gave everything for their country is actually dishonoring them,” Kick said. “They went over there in all of our names and died, and then when they come back home, they’re hidden behind a curtain. I think that’s wrong.”
Kick, of Tucson, Ariz., initially filed his Freedom of Information Act request in March 2003. The Air Force denied that request. But after he filed an appeal, “to my amazement” the ruling was reversed, he wrote on his Internet site [mjh: www.thememoryhole.org — off-line as I write this].
And on April 14, he received a CD with the 361 images.
Bush: Military should respect family privacy on photos of flag-draped coffins by RANDALL CHASE, CBC News
Democratic Representative Jim McDermott of Washington, who served in the navy during the Vietnam War, said photos of caskets coming home from Vietnam had a tremendous impact on the way Americans came to view that war.
”As people began to see the reality of it and see the 55,000 people who were killed coming back in body bags, they became more and more upset by the war,” he said. ”This is not about privacy. This is about trying to keep the country from facing the reality of war.”
An unrelated story in Wired about other Russ Kick activities. mjh
Wired News: Traveling Down the Memory Hole
As the Sept. 11 commission conducts hearings in Washington to investigate the government’s response to the terrorist attacks, a controversial video of President Bush is making the rounds on the Internet.
The video, which shows Bush sitting in a Florida classroom watching children read for more than five minutes after being told the United States was under siege, has become a popular Internet download. It’s posted on The Memory Hole [owned by Russ Kick], a website dedicated to publishing official data that is hard to find, censored or in danger of being lost.
When you start
telling the media what it can and can not inform the public about, you have effectively silenced the First Amendment rights guaranteeing
freedom.
One can only look to North Korea to see what media suppression looks like at its worst and here at home on a smaller scale.
But do we really want to be in any kind of comparison with North Korea when it comes to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?
Flag draped coffins are not a political issue. Flag draped coffins are the children you all sent to war, coming home. And shame on you
if you are afraid to look at them as they re-enter the USA!
So all of you who think the government should protect us from ourselves
and prevent the media from showing you one brief glimpse of reality… you go on driving your big SUV’s, pulling into your McMansions
with all the lights on, as you toss plastic goods into your plastic lives, but I for one am glad that a brave American stood up for what
he thought was right and forced you to look at the fruits of your war stance (informed or otherwise).
Sir… you keep showing those
pictures of my fellow Americans who sacrificed their lives in ignorance of their peers, but I for one would like to see them, and honor
them and their memory as I ponder their sacrifice vs. my leaders’ decisions.
Thank You.
David Natale